Bruised interrogation

Your car spins out on the ice at night like a silly toy top - something unraveling, quick flick of unwound string, your surprised breath escaping your body in an intricate mist of clouds and smoke. Ever since, you've been confused about whether or not you're still being spun, about whether or not the secret wisps and vapors of your breath have actually been returned to you, or parachuted out to chase their own illicit dragons, haunt their own obsessions. Catch your breath. It's been taken hostage. And sure enough, anxiety unexpectedly hunts you down and comes knocking on your door like a former lover - one it took far too long to forget, yet much too soon to regret. He laughs and laughs, tucks back the wayward lock that always falls in your eyes, then fills his hands with greedy selfish fistfuls of your hair and kisses you again and again. You know you should tell him to stop but you hesitate and let him kiss you some more - his thumbprint fingerprinting your upper arm - even though you know he's too tall, too glib, and too pretty in a silvery sort of way and isn't even the one you wanted to be kissing (and in truth, he never was), and you have to wonder where all this could possibly lead you. Because it can be dangerous not to pay attention to the where of things. A snag, a crack, a bump, black ice. You fall hard. Melodramatic bruise tattooed like a rain-soaked iris staining your knee. Day by day, it slowly pales like a Polaroid in reverse. So what happens when your body takes back these purples, these yellows, these waning blooms? Where do these flowers go after they become first baroque and overblown, before gradually disappearing back into your own skin? There could be questions. What will you say? Follow these procedures: The answers are permanent-markered inside you - name, rank, and serial number - like a dogtagged tattoo. Destroy all other personal effects and only recite the following: pistil, stamen, sepal, calyx, anther. Do not confess to anything else.

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Your car spins out on the ice at night like a silly toy top - something unraveling, quick flick of unwound string, your surprised breath escaping your body in an intricate mist of clouds and smoke. Ever since, you've been confused about whether or not you're still being spun, about whether or not the secret wisps and vapors of your breath have actually been returned to you, or parachuted out to chase their own illicit dragons, haunt their own obsessions. Catch your breath. It's been taken hostage. And sure enough, anxiety unexpectedly hunts you down and comes knocking on your door like a former lover - one it took far too long to forget, yet much too soon to regret. He laughs and laughs, tucks back the wayward lock that always falls in your eyes, then fills his hands with greedy selfish fistfuls of your hair and kisses you again and again. You know you should tell him to stop but you hesitate and let him kiss you some more - his thumbprint fingerprinting your upper arm - even though you know he's too tall, too glib, and too pretty in a silvery sort of way and isn't even the one you wanted to be kissing (and in truth, he never was), and you have to wonder where all this could possibly lead you. Because it can be dangerous not to pay attention to the where of things. A snag, a crack, a bump, black ice. You fall hard. Melodramatic bruise tattooed like a rain-soaked iris staining your knee. Day by day, it slowly pales like a Polaroid in reverse. So what happens when your body takes back these purples, these yellows, these waning blooms? Where do these flowers go after they become first baroque and overblown, before gradually disappearing back into your own skin? There could be questions. What will you say? Follow these procedures: The answers are permanent-markered inside you - name, rank, and serial number - like a dogtagged tattoo. Destroy all other personal effects and only recite the following: pistil, stamen, sepal, calyx, anther. Do not confess to anything else.

Corroborations 2012 was held at the University Libraries, The University of South Dakota, from January 20 – May 4, 2012. The Corroborations 2012 exhibition paired USD visual arts and poetry majors in order to create new collaborative work and to both broaden acceptance and appreciation of alternative art disciplines.